A helpful fellow on the Italian genealogy page on Facebook mentioned to me that he had sent an e-mail to the comune in Sicily that he was interested in asking for information about when certain family members were born, and that he received a response. Now, this fellow was born there so perhaps the city officials gave him a bit more of a response, but I'm curious about sending an e-mail to the folks in Atessa. I've got two e-mail addresses for them and would like to try at least.

that seem to be geared to physical mail as opposed to e-mail. I'm not sure if it would be appropriate to paste this text into an e-mail, perhaps with "inviarmene" replaced with "inviarmene per e-mail."

I'm also a bit concerned because, while I can't read Italian well, I can make out some of it, and the language in this form letter seems a bit abrupt. For any native Italian speakers here, does that form letter come across as rude or curt to you? Do you think I'm likely to get a response via e-mail? I suppose it couldn't hurt.

The form letter in your inquiry meets with Italian standards for communicating with an official Italian government bureaucracy. It is meant to be impersonal and efficient which make it appear to be abrupt. Responses to form letters requesting documents and/or responses usually take 4-8 weeks, do not require fees. If there is a need for a charge or fee you will be sent an invoice in advance for payment. Peter

Also, if one of the email addresses for the comune ends in @pec.it, then send your email via the other one. The PEC email system requires you to have your own account, and as it is difficult to set one up from outside of Italy, I assume you do not have one. Good luck.

Thank you, that form letter generator looks great! No, neither e-mail ends in pec. They both end in comunediatessa.it, which is the domain name for the comune itself, so it seems good. I'll give it a go tomorrow and let you all know how it goes!

There is another choice form letter at http://www.initaly.com/gene/mem/letter1.htm that goes line by line which you might find useful when you find your town of origin in Italy and run into a potential relative. Peter

Well, my great-grandmother and the mayor do have the same last name, so I can hope! I really would love to be able to tell my mom who her grandparents' parents were.

I remember doing research on my dad's side in Potenza and getting pretty far back, like into the 1700s in some places, and seeing almost every last name in the town on our family tree. My oldest brother asked me, "Do we have relatives there?" and I had to tell him, "Are you kidding? We're related to the whole town!"

under "A," the records for Atessa sustained "minor damage," and who knows what that means. I think the only next step for me is to physically write to them. I know that many times, when people physically write to ask, they enclose money to cover their expenses (postage, paper, etc.).

How on Earth is this money enclosed? I can't stick bills in there, and I have no idea whether a check drawn on an American bank in dollars will do them any good. Is enclosing a self-addressed stamped envelope a good idea?

Thanks to the online templates for letters, writing the actual letter isn't a problem, but how are the other logistical issues handled?

Sorry to pester. I'm just really anxious to find out as much as I can in this town; this is where my mom's mother was born, and my mom is 80. I really, really want to be able to share some information from this place with her while I still have her here.

Cheques are expensive cash in Italy, even if they are bank drafts and in Euro. If you need to send money to Italy buy Euros at your local bank and send cash telling the clerk to enjoy a coffee with anything left, otherwise they will send you coins in the reply. Do include an addressed envelope and a copy of some photo ID.